


Evolution: The Story of a Beginning

by MistralSoul



Category: Pocket Monsters | Pokemon (Anime)
Genre: Gen, Not Tagging Everyone, just a general fun time!, og pokeani rewrite
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-20
Updated: 2020-12-20
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:21:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,129
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28202298
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MistralSoul/pseuds/MistralSoul
Summary: Ever since he could comprehend what words meant, Ash always wanted to be a Pokemon Master. To him, that was simply one who mastered Pokemon by winning the Indigo Plateau and becoming champion. All his life had been leading up to that day, when he can finally say that he is, the Pokemon Master.And with a Pikachu as his starting partner and a bit of a rocky start, Ash learns there's more to his goal than just winning the Indigo Plateau. Much more than he ever expected. But that's okay, because he has friends and Pokemon on his side. He just needs to learn how to navigate the world that he wishes to understand.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 8





	Evolution: The Story of a Beginning

**Author's Note:**

> So I've had this fic idea for a long time. It all started on International Ash Day, a day I was only made aware of by Pokemon themselves posting a video of Ash's Indigo League loss and using that to celebrate the day. Uh... I think on that day I signed custody papers to make Ash legally mine? XD Anyway, I just, there's some issues with the og pokeani, but it's my favorite season because its about being the best, but also not really. It's about learning and helping others, so I wanted to take that feel and rewrite the entirety of the Indigo League season based on how I would've preferred everything going down. It's not done, I only have about 6 chapters planned on paper and a million ideas for later chapters in my mind, but I hope you enjoy!

Lights. Bright ones, ones that you’d expect to belong as part of a spotlight, but lights nonetheless. And they were on Ash, as he stood on top of a platform, holding a trophy and having a medal draped over his neck. A gold medal, the same color gold as his trophy. On either side of him, on platforms of varying heights, were two other trainers. One he didn’t recognize - his outfit was mostly green and hair the same color as the person that Ash did recognize, Gary. Who happened to have a silver medal dangling from his neck, while the trainer he didn’t recognize had a bronze one. Both of their expressions were unreadable.

“Come on, lighten up you guys, you did great!” Ash says, even though he had no idea what was going on. He could only assume he won something, but what that something was…

Oh! Oh Mew he’s stupid, the Indigo League! That’s what he won. The event he’s been looking forward to ever since he was old enough to retain info. No wonder the other two looked so upset (although, they didn’t look one-hundred percent upset), they lost to the great Ash. But it had to have been a fair fight, right? They must’ve been good to be standing next to him. 

But no response from either of them. To be fair though, Ash expected no response from Gary - he was always like this, not necessarily one to think highly of Ash. But the other trainer? Well, to be honest, Ash knew nothing of him. So he tried to go and ask, but as soon as he turned his head there was a microphone in his face and someone calling his name.

“Ash, you know it’s time for you to wake up, right?”

“Wake up?” he responds back, his voice cracking on the second syllable. Why would he be told to wake up now? He wasn’t dreaming, he won the league! That couldn’t have been a dream, right?

But then… If it wasn’t a dream and was reality, why didn’t he remember anything about his matches? 

“You said you’d be up in time to go to the Professor’s lab! Without my aid.”

Right he was, he didn’t even have a Pokemon yet… But if he had this dream, it meant he had chosen a partner, right? So then… Who was his partner?

“Give me five more minutes mom,” he says, trailing off as he can feel his body turn to the side, as if that would help him not hear his mom. But it was too late, he was already awake, and his eyes ended up focusing on the posture he had taped to his yellow walls.

“Oh dear, what am I ever going to do with you? You have one minute before I find the pot and ladle.”

Ash whips around, catching his mom as she sneaks a glance to see if he’s up, and as soon as she notices him she turns around and gives a sigh of relief. “Thank god, I think all the pots have something in them.”

“With what?” Ash asks, rubbing his eye to get the sleepiness out. 

“Food, silly. I made your breakfast favorites.”

“All of them?” 

“Of course! My son is growing up to be just like his father, though I do hope…” his mom trails off, her eyes landing towards the window. She never spoke much about his dad, so all Ash could tell was that she wanted him, as in Ash, home.

“I’ll visit, don’t worry!” 

“I know you will. Say, it took your dad three days to reach Viridian City, do you think you can beat that?” she asks, her attention turned back towards Ash. 

With a smile, Ash responds. “Of course I can! I can even win the league too, I’ll bet Mew’s existence on it!”

His mom moves closer to Ash, close enough that she can reach her hand out and ruffle his hair, much to Ash’s protest. “That’s my boy. Now hurry up and get dressed, you don’t have all day!”

As Ash’s mom closes the door, Ash rips off his covers and changes his clothes in record speed, not at all caring for whether or not he looks put together or not. That didn’t matter, he was going on a journey, appearance was secondary. What he did take pride in, however, was his hat. A simple red and white baseball cap with the green logo of the league; his most prized possession. Technically it was supposed to cost him nothing more than postage and boxes of different cereals and snacks he was supposed to collect over the period of six months, so daily shopping needs, but there was something about his need for this particular hat that he ended up convincing his mom to buy everything they needed within a month. And about three months later, the hat arrived, being treasured by Ash ever since. So this time he looked in the mirror as he put it on (noticing how his shirt was partially tucked as well, but he decided it was just a new trend), making sure it was on perfectly. Then, since he was unable to have any Pokeballs on hand, he took his Voltorb alarm clock and posed with it - his thumb, index, and middle fingers of his left hand holding down the brim of his hat while his right cradled the alarm clock. That was it, he was almost a Pokemon Trainer, the day he dreamed about.

And he was one step closer to getting to his dream of winning the league.

He opens his door and flies down the stairs, ready to feast on the breakfast that his mom prepared for him, before his eyes land on the clock. It was fifty minutes past the hour, and he was supposed to arrive at the Professor’s in ten minutes.

Which meant he had to bolt it out of the door right now.

“Mom?” Ash says as she sets the table, putting an omelet shaped like a Cleffa as the very last thing on the table. She simply “hm”s in response to Ash, so he calls her again.

“Do you not want this?” 

“No no that’s not it!” Ash says, waving his hands in a no motion as he does so. “It’s just,” he starts, gesturing to the clock with his head, “I have to be at the Professor’s really soon.”

His mom puts down the bottle of ketchup and puts her hands on her hips. “No worries, you’ll make it in time!”

Ash nods, about to take a step towards the door before he’s yanked by his collar. “What gives, Mom?” he asks, turning around to face her.

“I mean, Ash, let’s face it, you can’t do much when you’re hungry. Besides, no child of mine is ever going to skip breakfast, you hear me? Eat every meal of the day.”

He hated that she was right.

“But Mom if I don’t go now I won’t get a Pokemon!”

“There’s no way Professor Oak doesn’t have enough for all of you, now is there?” 

With a sigh, Ash responds. “I guess not.”

“Now at least eat something, you’re wasting time!”

As she lets go of his collar, Ash sits down and starts to shove the omelet in his mouth as quickly as he can without choking, keeping an eye on the clock. Two minutes till the hour. One, zero, two minutes past, three minutes past as he downs a glass of juice and stands up. He thanks his mom for the meal and barrels out the door before she can even get in a speech about taking care of himself. He was late, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t getting a Pokemon.

It just meant he was getting the best Pokemon, as they were saving the best for last.

He runs to the Professor’s lab in record time, making it in about six minutes as opposed to the usual ten, and there’s no one outside the lab to greet him. Ash shrugs and makes his way up the hill before the sound of an explosion causes him to stop dead in his tracks. Something wasn’t going right, and he was going to figure it out.

Running up the rest of the way, Ash finds himself in front of everyone, including two people in shirts with red letter R’s on them and a Meowth. They were standing in front of all of the trainers and the Professor, holding the rope that tied them together like a leash. 

“Ash, stay away!” the Professor calls out just as the one with long red hair snarls at Ash.

“Look James, it’s another twerp. You think he has any Pokemon?”

The purple haired one turns his attention away from the Professor and focuses it on Ash. “I’m not sure Jessie, but he better prepare for trouble.”

“That’s my line you little -” but as she says that, the Meowth scratches her face. 

“Listen,” the Meowth starts, probably trying to get more out but Ash interjects.

“You can talk? Wow that’s -”

“Can it, twerp,” the Meowth fires back. “You’re nothing more than an eyesore. Now hand over whatever Pokemon you have and be gone with us.” The two… Trainers to the Meowth (although at this point, Ash was starting to think the Meowth owned them) nodded before striking a pose.

“Go home crying to your mommy,” James says, laughing as he says so. The Professor’s face goes from concerned to ashamed, and Ash can only assume one thing from that.

“Oh so you don’t even want to try me?” Ash says, getting his body in position to run. He had no Pokemon, he was powerless, but he didn’t want to be powerless. He was going to be a Pokemon Master - the winner of the Indigo League. That meant he couldn’t be powerless, that meant he had to do the right thing.

“Ash, please, I’m begging you, run!”

“I’ll handle this,” the Meowth says, unleashing its claws. 

It leaps in the air as Ash tries to make up the distance between him and his tied up friends. But before he can register what happens, the stinging feeling of a scratch on his face - multiple, actually - stop him and force him to stumble, nearly landing face first on the ground in front of him. There’s sounds of snickering from the two that challenged him, and a bit of blood on Ash’s gloves (something he knew his mom would have a field day cleaning) but that didn’t stop him. Instead he looked James in the eye with a glare and charged again as both of them called on Meowth to attack him again. By the time the Meowth reacted and got close enough, Ash had successfully managed knock James to the floor with a thud - something Ash only assumed he was able to do because James wasn’t prepared for it. But the moment he did so, he felt a scratch tear into his back and the side of his stomach reel with pain as a pointed toe of a boot (which he assumed belong to Jessie since he was on top of James) kicked him with enough force to knock Ash off of James and roll just barely into the greenery. 

“Ash! Stop this, you’ll get hurt!” the Professor calls out, before getting slapped in the face by Jessie.

As Ash gets up, he sees James get up to his feet and reach for a Pokeball on his belt. Oh… This is a little unfair, Ash thinks, hoping it wasn’t anything too serious that this man had. He knew he should stop at some point, for his own sake and his mom’s - just how would she handle losing the only family she had after his dad just poofed out of their life - but there was something in him that told him he had a chance. Something that told him he can do this, no matter the odds, and save the day. Because that’s what he did, he helped those in need. That was how he was raised. 

And that help came in the sound of shattering glass.

“What? I thought we got all of them! James,” Jessie yells, distracting James as a yellow little Pokemon comes out of the window, its red cheeks sparking with energy.

Pikachu, the electric mouse Pokemon.

“Hey Pikachu!” Ash yells as the Meowth readies its claws to attack. “Wanna help me?”

The Pikachu shoots a quick look over to Ash before nodding its head an inch, smirking as it lets out a huge bout of electricity aimed towards the Meowth, shocking it unconscious. The two trainers scramble to get their other Pokemon out as Ash runs out of sight and to the Professor and the rest of the trainers. Jessie and James are occupied with commanding their Ekans and Koffing against the Pikachu that keeps giving what Ash can only assume as the move Thunderbolt to them, shocking them unconscious and unable to battle. As soon as Ash unties the knot and gets checked over by the Professor and thanked by all trainers except Gary, the duo turn their attention towards Ash, pointing a finger and snarling.

“We’ll make sure you never forget the face of Team Rocket. Consider yourself a target.” 

Throwing a ton of Pokeballs, presumably stolen, into the air, the duo dash off with the fainted Meowth in tow, gone before any sort of justice can be dealt with.

The two other trainers immediately surround Ash, giving him various amounts of praise. It’s easy to take, for about a second, as Ash rubs the back of his head and says it was nothing, but after that second he turns to look at Gary, who simply turns his head in disgust. 

“Gary?” Ash says in the midst of the praise.

“You just got lucky, that’s all. Don’t expect any praise from me.”

“Hey, that’s rude you know,” the trainer with a blue cap says.

“Yeah! Without him we would’ve never been untied!” the other trainer says, but Gary just “huffs” in response.

“We were saved thanks to that Pikachu, not Ash.”

“Oh yeah?” Ash starts, this time turning to face Gary, his hands forming fists.

“I said what I said. Hey Gramps, what’s the situation with the Pokemon?” Gary says as the Professor is checking the Pokeballs, most likely checking to make sure the starters were safe. 

“Just a moment please!” And a moment later, the Professor comes back, cradling three Pokeballs in his hand. The Pikachu that helped Ash trails behind him, staying at his legs instead of making a move to any one particular trainer. “Now, well, even before Team Rocket showed up, we had a slight issue. You see, I was supposed to have two sets of starters ready for four trainers, but the transporting of the second batch got delayed for unknown reasons, so I’m left only with one set. Now, there is another set coming soon for another trainer, separate from this batch, coming within two weeks, if one of you doesn’t mind waiting, though that means your rival would be from Frodomar and not Palette, but I suppose it’s a better option than me turning you down,” he says with a laugh. A nervous one, but still a laugh regardless.

“I think he should pick first,” the blue capped trainer says, gesturing towards Ash.

“Me?”

“Yeah you, you did save us, after all.”

“Well, I guess,” Ash says as the Professor opens all three Pokeballs, the cries of Bulbasaur, Squirtle, and Charmander ringing in his ears.

He never did manage to just pick one.

“Hey, Professor, do you think I can have that Pikachu that’s behind you?” he asked to the shock of the Professor.

“Well, uh -”

“I mean, if that Pikachu is available it means everyone can start now, right?”

“Well yes but, that Pikachu is highly -” as soon as he said that, the Pikachu walked forward to Ash, checking him out as Ash knelt down and put out a hand. The Pikachu smiled and instead of letting Ash do a handshake with its tail like he intended, it jumped up onto his shoulder.

“You see, he likes me!” Ash says, laughing as the Pikachu nudges his face. 

“Well, I suppose that does settle one issue. So, I’m assuming that Gary would like to be next?”

Gary walks over to the three Pokemon, eying them before staring the Professor in the eye. “I’ll beat him without a type advantage. After all, it was just sheer luck that got him this far.” 

The Professor sighs and returns Squirtle to its Pokeball and handing it to Gary. The other two trainers pick the remaining Pokemon and the Professor hands each of them a Pokedex and a couple of Pokeballs. With this, he sets them off on their journey, and as they walk down the hill there’s a group of people there. Most Ash aren’t able to recognize, probably just the residents of Palette wanting to wish them all well, although two he did recognize, and both of them made a beeline for their respective trainers.

Sadly, Ash was unable to watch Gary get babied by his older sister Daisy.

“Oh! You got a Pikachu? I always thought you were going to go with Charmander,” his mom says with a laugh. 

“No it was always going to be Bulbasaur!” Ash says back, laughing as well until he could hear the sparks fly from Pikachu’s cheeks. “But I love this Pikachu, he helped me so much.” 

“Pika!”

“I’m sure you two will make a wonderful duo,” his mom says, smiling as she reaches to pet Pikachu. “Just remember to call everyday, okay? I want to see my son’s smiling face.”

“Mom…” Ash rolls his eyes, she laughs even more. “Okay fine, I’ll try.”

“And be good! Take showers daily! And remember -”

“Okay okay! I got it mom!”

She moves her hand off of Pikachu’s head and removes Ash’s hat, using her other hand to ruffle his hair. “I know. You’re going to do amazing, Ash.”

He gives her a nervous smile, knowing exactly what was going through Gary’s mind if he could see what was going on. “Such a baby,” his favorite thing to say to Ash. Didn’t help his mom treated him like so.

“Well, don’t want to hurt your chances at the bet, so I best leave you then.”

“What bet?”

“Oh silly, beating your dad’s record to Viridian City!”

Oh right! Although, to be fair, he didn’t know it was a proper bet. “Yeah, don’t worry I’ll win.”

She gives a slight laugh before embracing him into a hug. “Give them Moltres’ rage for me, okay?” 

“I bet it on Mew’s existence.”

**Author's Note:**

> If you enjoyed that chapter, consider leaving me a review! Or maybe shoot me a message over on my twitter by the same name? I'd love to interact with you, especially since you took the time to read my fic! Haha, well, see you next time!


End file.
